A baby girl has been tragically mauled by two dogs somewhere in Leicester. This has brought about some debate around animal control, to the point that I feel the need to comment about this myself. However, regardless of the nature of the debate, the important fact here is that a baby girl has died before she had a chance to live. My thoughts are with her family.

Now, unfortunately, the two dogs that mauled this poor girl just so happened to be Rottweilers. It takes no more than that to get the insipid slime that coats the skin of humanity to pick up their torches and pitchforks and start calling for the breed itself to be banned from these shores. The implication being that the dogs are dangerous and vicious beasts that kill children on a whim.

This is nothing more than ill-concieved, ignorant trash. My parents owned a Rottweiler when I was younger. I was 8 or 9 years old at the time. We called him Rocky, because we knew he was going to grow up to be a large, strong animal. And indeed large and strong he was. But he wasn't violent. He wasn't vicious, or even aggressive. Indeed, he only barked when he wanted attention for himself. Something which passers-by only ever understood if they looked him in the eye. I remember wrestling him in the back garden. He was bigger than me, and could put up quite a fight. But he never got rough. He never snapped or bit or mauled.

The difference being that he was raised by a caring family. We didn't get him to be a guard dog to scare off the postie or to keep unwanteds from the doorstep (although, admittedly, he did a fine job of it), he was a part of the family.

The logic is so completely universal that it pains me that I have to repeat it and watch it fall upon deaf ears once again. I'm not even going to spell it out because it's so fucking plain.

But I'll tell you this. Give me a cute little puppy. A little terrier, a miniature beagle or a damn german sausage dog or something. So cute, so sweet, so innocent. I'll turn it into a rabid killer that tears out the throats of (specifically) anyone audacious enough to be wearing a pink clothing item above the waist. Why? Because it can be done. I could take Doberman/Rottweiler/Pitbull mix-breed and give you a submissive little honey that fetches your paper and sits placidly on your feet to keep them warm in the winter.

Because dogs are sentient beings. Just like any human being, they can be whatever their 'parents' make the effort to make them. The dogs that mauled this child were clearly, by implication, a product of either deliberate 'beefing', or simple neglect.

Another part of the newly raised debate is the possibility of making sure that pet owners are qualified to own their pets through owner licencing. Regular inspection of owners, apparently, should also happen, to ensure that they are managing their responsibilities towards their pets.

Because they're smart, and they need to be exercised, trained and entertained. Constantly.

I have to say that a smile does creep its way inexorably up one side of my face as I realise that we're more than happy to enforce the licencing of pet owners to ensure they are meeting the social and intellectual needs of their pets, but when it comes to raising kids, we really don't give a flying fuck what anybody does.

We cry bloody murder when some idiot is negligent enough to turn a poorly trained dog loose on the world - with tragic consequences - but every day we witness far more horrific acts of violence and harm committed by other human beings. It happens so much we're indifferent to it. Oh, gun crime is up. Oh, kids are robbing pensioners on the streets. Oh, my favourite park bench has been vandalised by idiot kids with nothing better to do.

Wake up.

Smell the coffee.

IB

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